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Barbara - posted on 08/21/2012

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Hey! I'm from Oregon and my husband went into the oilfields in January (2012). For 6 months I kept working/and being a mom in Oregon while he was away. When my company went out of business I moved to North Dakota. At first I loved living here, but I am extremely homesick! I've had a harder time being away from all my family and friends and moving here, because even though we see eachother more often than we did...You still won't get to spend very much time together. I've heard it refered to as a "lifestyle", and indeed it is. It is HARD! I am a highly qualified and experienced health care provider, but even in the state with the lowest unemployment rate, it's hard to get a job. I've applied and interviewed for many job positions, but I feel like as nice as North Dakotans seem, they are a tight community and it's hard to be an "outsider".

Hey! I'm from Oregon and my husband went into the oilfields in January (2012). For 6 months I kept working/and being a mom in Oregon while he was away. When my company went out of business I moved to North Dakota. At first I loved living here, but I am extremely homesick! I've had a harder time being away from all my family and friends and moving here, because even though we see eachother more often than we did...You still won't get to spend very much time together. I've heard it refered to as a "lifestyle", and indeed it is. It is HARD! I am a highly qualified and experienced health care provider, but even in the state with the lowest unemployment rate, it's hard to get a job. I've applied and interviewed for many job positions, but I feel like as nice as North Dakotans seem, they are a tight community and it's hard to be an "outsider".

My husband has worked in ND for 3 years while I stayed in Tx with our two small boys. We couldn't handle the long distance anymore so just 3 weeks ago my sons and I moved to ND to be with him. I am happy to see him every night but I do miss our home. ND is nice but Tx is home. Being and oilfield wife is hard and very challenging but if you both have faith and trust it will work out. Good luck!

Im right there with you. I am actually debating on moving to be closer to my husband. He has been working there for about a year and I see him once every 3 months, It is so hard, and even harder to decide if I should bring my daughter there or not.

Our girls are 8 and 6 1/2 and our son is 5. I am trying to arrange for me to go visit him in July and then he will come home for two weeks in late August/September. We are hoping that he can stay there long enough that we can get caught up financially and put a down payment on a house. Who knows how long that will take. As far as I know, his company doesn't help him get home to visit, but we are still very new at this. He gets his first check this weekend and he is hoping to buy a laptop so that we can Skype. We have done that with my brother in Germany and really like it! We are doing alright, but it sure is a big change- some days are harder than others!

Hey Tabetha!My husband heads to Alberta periodically to work as an electrician. We are fortunate to have great conditions... the company flies him home one week every month. We have done this three times now for 2-6 months.

This spring we were finally able to use Skype with more success than in the past. That has helped our family to stay connected. But it is still definitely challenging.